Page:Shakespeare's Sonnets (1923) Yale.djvu/99

Shakespeare's Sonnets there is no personal reference in 'suborn'd informer'; it means any false idea or detraction of the poet's devotion.

The Quarto indicates by brackets that two lines are missing after the final couplet, yet this twelve-line poem, written not in sonnet form but in couplets, is complete as it stands. It serves to mark the conclusion of the sonnets addressed to the friend.

The dark woman of the following sonnets is as much a mystery as ever, despite the many pages that editors, critics, and playwrights have devoted to her. Some scholars and dramatists assume her to be a maid of honor of Queen Elizabeth, Mary Fitton, at one time the mistress of William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke. She was evidently attractive, for she was married twice after the Pembroke affair. With the praise of dark beauty in this sonnet compare Love's Labour's Lost IV. iii. 247–265.

In the old age black was not counted fair. 'Black' in this sonnet and in the following ones, means 'dark complexioned,' 'brunette'; while 'fair' means both 'light complexioned' and 'beautiful.'

jacks. 'In the virginal, an upright piece of wood fixed to the key-lever and fitted with a quill which plucked the string as the jack rose when the key was pressed down. Here used as "key. Onions.

 The expense of spirit in a waste of shame Is lust in action; and till action, lust Is perjur'd. Lust when put into action spends the spirit in a shameful waste; and until it acts, Lust is perjur'd.

In this and in the following sonnet, Shakespeare writes a series of puns on the word 'will,' using it as a proper name, as 'wish,' and as 'lust.' Used as a proper name, Will in over-plus; More than enough am I' (ll. 2, 3), refers to Shakespeare; Will to boot,' (l. 2) refers to another man, possibly to the friend of sonnet 133, l. 2.